Downing the Dukes
December 09, 2006 09:32 PM | General
December 9, 2006
BOX SCORE
PITTSBURGH – Duquesne found out Saturday night that it can shoot 52 percent from the field and still lose by 31 points to a West Virginia basketball team loaded with 3-point shooters.
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| Darris Nichols attempts a pass during the first half of West Virginia's game against Duquesne at the A.J. Palumbo Center in Pittsburgh. The Mountaineers won the game 85-54.
AP photo |
The Mountaineers (7-1) made 17 of 29 3s for the game to cruise to an easy 85-54 victory over the Dukes at the A.J. Palumbo Center in Pittsburgh.
“I’ve been noticing lately the way we’ve been shooting in practice everybody has got a lot of confidence,” said West Virginia coach John Beilein. “They’ve worked very hard. Darris Nichols, Alex Ruoff, Joe Alexander, Frank Young … they’ve put in a lot of shots between last year and this year waiting for this opportunity.”
West Virginia already made three 3s before the first media timeout and was 6 of 7 from behind the arch with barely nine minutes gone in the game. A 10-point flurry boosted West Virginia’s lead to 20, 39-19 and the Mountaineers led by that margin at halftime.
Duquesne (2-6) fought back to cut WVU’s lead to 14 after a Robert Mitchell 3 made the score 53-39, but West Virginia responded with 14 straight points to remove any doubt about the outcome of the game. Twelve of those points came on 3s with Alex Ruoff making three of them.
“With the 3-point ball it can be down to 12 in no time,” Beilein said. “I told my guys we’re not letting it go below 15 without a timeout. You don’t want to use it right away because you scare them. We got it back to 19 and we ended up making some pretty good plays.”
Ruoff finished with a career-high six 3-point baskets to score 18 points; the sophomore has now made 11 3s in his last two games against Duquesne and N.C. State.
Frank Young was 5 for 5 from 3 in the first half and didn’t try a single 3-point shot in the second half. He finished with 18 also.
“When Frank comes out firing the way he did … I asked him, ‘Did you make any in the second half?’ He said, ‘No I didn’t shoot any.’ I made a point to our younger players that that’s why we win because that’s all he cares about,” Beilein said.
Joe Alexander scored 15 and Da’Sean Butler came off the bench to contribute 10. Six different players made 3-point baskets and six different players scored at least eight points for the Mountaineers.
West Virginia carved up Duquesne like a skilled surgeon Saturday night, especially in transition.
“They were playing a lot of different defenses and we had them in transition D a lot and I don’t think they’re used to have four shooters run down the floor,” Beilein explained. “There was always a guy trying to match up with somebody else and when you’re changing defenses all the time people sometimes don’t get locked down on your guy. It happens to us, too.”
Duquesne got a game-high 22 points from talented freshman Robert Mitchell. Kieron Achara added 15 for the Dukes.
The Mountaineers forced 24 Duquesne turnovers and turned those into 38 points.
“We had great balance; we had 23 assists on 31 baskets. I didn’t like the 11 turnovers but we forced 24,” Beilein said. “A couple of (West Virginia’s turnovers) were crazy stuff – things that we have to clean up. Sometimes they think they’ve got grenades in their hands. They think if they don’t do something with the ball it’s going to explode.”
West Virginia has now won four straight over the Dukes and is 7-5 all-time at the Palumbo Center. Prior to tonight’s game, three of the last four games against Duquesne had been decided by four points or less.
WVU has a week off for final examinations before returning to the court to face Savannah State next Saturday at the WVU Coliseum.
That game will tip at 4 pm.
